


i'm a pair of unfocused eyes focused on you

by toflowerknights



Series: the Skybox series [3]
Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-19
Updated: 2014-07-19
Packaged: 2018-02-09 13:32:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1984791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toflowerknights/pseuds/toflowerknights





	i'm a pair of unfocused eyes focused on you

His life didn't change much after he was locked up. He still woke up way too early and still had way too little to do with his time. So Miller spent his days watching the other prisoners. It started each morning with his cellmate Dixon, a pale and fragile boy that couldn't be more than fifteen. He never stopped wringing his hands together and Miller wondered if he ever slept. The bags under his eyes suggested otherwise. Then he, once he was out of his cell he would try to get noticed as little as possible, and find out as much as possible about the other people in his section.

He stayed away from the people like Murphy who hurt people for fun, and the people who talked to themselves while repeatedly banging their heads against the wall. Miller knew that he had a good chance to get out of there without getting floated and wasn't about to make his situation worse. He saw people fade away or grow cold the longer they stayed locked up and he saw people grow sad. There was a few people who stood out to him though.

He saw a boy with goggles on his head that never left his, what had to be, best friends side. He found out that they were named Jasper and Monty. Two stoners from the same section as him. They always looked as if they were in high spirits, but Miller could see the sadness grow in Jasper's eyes. He wondered if Monty could see it too. There was Roma, a girl with hair down to her waist that used her body to get what she wanted. She waited for Miller once and with one smile beckoned him closer. Miller had no good reason to say no, and after that she would come to him whenever she felt like it and they would share body heat and kisses between the cool sheets of his bed. Never hers, but Miller wasn't one to complain.

One boy, named Jackson, who was in for murder spread so much joy around him that Miller wondered if he had been framed. Two months later he got floated and Miller guessed it didn't really matter.

There was a girl no one would talk to with long, dark hair up in a pony tail that swung her legs over the edge of the floor and looked down into the deep, as if her answers or happiness would be found somewhere down there. She looked as alone in the world as Miller felt some days. Sadness was evident in the way her shoulders hunched, but they would always life when she was joined by a girl that lived close to Miller. But then that girl disappeared and the shoulders grew tight again. That was the only time Miller had considered breaking his promise to himself to come out from the shadows.

-

One day when Miller walked back to his cell he was welcomed with blood covering the better part of the floor. His cellmate was leaning against the wall with eyes unfocused and skin a pasty grey. Miller didn't move, eyes too fixed on the red gashes on his wrists to react. The guard doing the count came up to him demanding to know what took so long. Then suddenly everything was in motion and Miller was pushed to the side as several guards ran past him to check Dixon's non-moving pulse, while another pushed Miller up against the wall outside his cell and asked him multiple questions that all ended with ' _Did you know anything about this?_ '.

It took another twenty minutes for them to remove Dixon's body and _another_ thirty for them to wipe away every trace of what had happened. Miller wasn't allowed to move from his spot against the wall and spent the time listening on the doctor talking to the guards. Apparently Dixon had been mentally unstable for several months. Miller hadn't known. But it wasn't as if they had been close.

He spent that night alone with his eyes fixed on the faint shadow on the ground where the blood hadn't really washed away. 

The day after he was joined by another guy named Dax who stood twice as tall as him and brought a tense mood with him. He wanted to talk to Miller, all the time, and Miller missed the silence from when Dixon was alive. You never know how good you have it until it's gone and all that. Miller tried to block him out as much as he could. Suddenly to comfort of his silent cell was gone and he found himself confused as to what to do now. He walked back and forth across the sections to waste the time before it was time to sleep.

Roma brought him into her room for the first time a week after Dixon's death and rode him slowly and Miller dug his hands into her hips as he came. After, when they were still sweaty and breathing heavily, she draped herself across his chest and drew pictures on his skin with the tips of her fingers. "Was it awful?" she asked quietly and Miller didn't know what to answer.

"I hardly knew him," he said quietly and somehow it felt like a lie. Roma nodded quietly and when she couldn't stand the silence any longer she straddled him once more before kissing her way down his body. Miller appreciated the distraction and closed his eyes. The back of his eyelids were tinted red.

-

His father came to visit once, months after his arrest, and it was a painful thirty minutes with his dad casting disappointed glances at his son from across the table. Miller guessed he understood. It wasn't as if he had gotten arrested doing something noble. All he had done was getting drunk and break into the control room, and somehow pressed a button that was connected to the speaker system letting the whole Ark listen to him sing his heart out. So much for giving pride to the family name.

His father left before the time was up and didn't say if he would visit again. Miller guessed that was for the best, but he would've liked to see his mother at least once. He bumped into the girl with the tight shoulders, Octavia he reminded himself, on the way back and she reached out a to grasp at his sleeve. "Are you okay?" she asked uncertainly and Miller felt awkwardness seep into his bloodstream. It was the first time someone had asked him that question since he got locked up. He didn't know how to answer. He tugged gently at his sleeve and Octavia let go with a small, apologetic grimace.

"I'm fine," he said slowly, testing the words to see if they rung true. No alarms went off inside his head, so he guessed he was close enough to the truth. Octavia smiled tentatively at him, as if she was unsure how to proceed.

"It's just..." she began and shifted from foot to foot. "You look really lonely." Miller didn't know how to reply and Octavia took that as a sign to leave, because she nodded with a tight smile and was gone within moments. Miller didn't move. He wondered if he'd always been this numb, or if he had been so busy studying other people that he had forgotten about himself.


End file.
